


here comes original sin

by TheJGatsby



Series: potentially lovely perpetually human [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-03
Updated: 2016-03-03
Packaged: 2018-05-24 10:42:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6151009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheJGatsby/pseuds/TheJGatsby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Kylo was a boy, when he still called himself Ben and felt at home in the name, he started hearing a voice in his head.<br/>(Or, Kylo Ren avenges Ben Solo)</p>
            </blockquote>





	here comes original sin

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Hero of the Story by Regina Spektor

When Kylo was a boy, when he still called himself Ben and felt at home in the name, he started hearing a voice in his head. It seemed to know everything about him, and it sounded so sure and authoritative as it whispered its dark, horrible lies into his young ears, fostering the fear and anger and insecurity in his heart. And it never went away- it was there when he was alone, drowning out his own thoughts, and it was there when he wasn’t, talking over everyone around him, and it dominated his dreams, filling them with the looming, sinister bogeymen of isolation and rejection.

His turn from the light wasn’t for want of power, it was because of loneliness and fear. Snoke had seen him and known him and exploited him, and had kept him enthralled with the belief that there was nothing else, that he had destroyed every other choice he’d had.

And then along came Rey, and Kylo broke into her head, and for a brief, infinite moment, he  _ saw _ her- lonely and afraid, waiting endlessly for people who were never going to come back, trying to convince herself that the voice in her head telling her no one loved her was wrong. And there they were, in the space between their minds, underneath it all just the same lonely children who’d been left behind, who’d had no one to scare away the monsters under their beds, who’d had to learn how to take care of themselves in ways they shouldn’t have had to.

That was what changed him, in the end. He saw where they were the same, and then he saw where they were different. She’d learned to fight her demons, while he’d become their puppet. But no more. All that ends today, as he strides towards the temple where Snoke sits on his throne, physically weak, vulnerable, and utterly powerless without the grip of fear and solitude over Kylo.

Because what Rey showed him wasn’t just the allure of the light- it was that the choice to fight back was his to make, and he was  _ tired _ of people trying to make his decisions for him. No more Ben Solo, no more Kylo Ren, no more helpless child, terrified apprentice, puppet prince,  _ victim _ . It’s time for something new.

* * *

 

He’s sure he should feel… something. Panic, trepidation, doubt,  _ something _ . But as he watches the planet get closer and closer in his shuttle’s viewport, he’s filled with a sense of calm determination, the kind of grim resolve that comes from addressing a problem that should have been fixed long ago.

Kylo Ren isn’t afraid to face his master. There’s been enough of fear- almost thirty years of it, and he’s finished. It all comes to this, everything he’s done, all he’s suffered, it was all leading up to  _ this _ moment, and he doesn’t know what comes after, but he’ll face that when the time comes.

Snoke is as imposing as he intends to be, sitting in an elevated throne, swathed in darkness, his mutilated face looking down haughtily on anyone who approaches. When he steps into the room, Kylo Ren feels the familiar surge of fear and admiration, but it fades quickly in favor of something like repulsion.

“You’ve failed me, Kylo Ren,” rasps the withered creature on the throne, but Kylo doesn’t stop, doesn’t respond, just keeps striding forward. “You allowed the weapon to be destroyed and the girl to escape.”

“That I did,” says Kylo, with a hint of amusement. He’s at the foot of the dais now, and he starts climbing. “Can’t say I regret it.”

“Why, y-” Snoke is cut off by the crackle of Kylo Ren’s lightsaber as he ignites it and thrusts it forward into his master’s chest, twisting it and jerking it upwards to ensure irreparable damage.

“And you can add this to the very short list of things I don’t regret.”

Snoke slumps forward onto Ren’s arm.

“Traitor,” he says, weak and rattling. “You’ll… pay….”

With a rush like wind, Snoke’s presence disappears from the Force, and it’s like a weight leaving Kylo’s shoulders. He hadn’t realized how tight Snoke’s grasp on him was until it was gone, and he feels dizzy and disoriented with freedom.

It feels too easy, that all he had to do was walk up and stab the bastard, and it was done. But at the same time he realizes just how heavily Snoke depended on Kylo seeing him as formidable, on Kylo’s fear and awe and unwillingness to ever stand against the creature that loomed so towering and ominous in his mind since childhood. But at the end of the day, Snoke was old, and frail, and arrogant, and that was his downfall. So Kylo extinguishes his lightsaber and steps aside, watching Snoke’s body slump forward and crumple to the floor.

He turns on his black-booted heel and walks away, free.

* * *

 

“What happened, Lord Ren?” asks one of the stormtroopers as Kylo strolls out of the temple. “That was awfully fast.”

“Get ready, we’re leaving,” Kylo replies, his voice carefully even as to betray nothing. The troops don’t question further, scrambling instead to ready the ship for launch.

“Where are we going, sir?”

“How far can we get before the Finalizer notices we’re gone?”

The trooper, TK-4496, he thinks, shifts uncomfortably. “Um, well, probably a couple hundred systems, further if we disable our tracking-”

“Good. Do that. Take us as far as we can get, then land in the biggest spaceport you can find. Understood?”

“Yes, sir, I-”

“Thank you.”

TK-4496 stands there a moment longer, looking as if he wants to question Kylo, then thinks better of it, turns, and hurries away, leaving Kylo alone. Kylo can feel the fear and unease in the ship like a noxious cloud, and it starts to creep up on him the exact repercussions of what he’s done. Snoke is  _ dead _ , and he knows exactly what that means for the First Order, and he knows it’s only a matter of time until Hux finds out and then-

Kylo reaches up and practically tears his new helmet off his head, throwing it across the room like it’s burned him. Freeing himself from that doesn’t make him feel any less suffocated, constricted, and he tears off his gloves next, slamming his bare fists into the console in front of him over and over until his hands start to bleed. The faint sting brings him back to himself and he stands there, leaning heavily on the console, his blood dripping down it, chest heaving with labored breath. He’s grateful for his solitude, doesn’t think he could bear the wary eyes of his stormtroopers.

He presses his hands flat against the shattered console, sharp edges cutting into his hands, and breathes deeply, letting the pain calm him and center him back on himself. He’s a fugitive now, that much is obvious, and he has to start acting like it. Eyes closed, steeled against the onslaught of emotion certain to come, he lets himself think,  _ What would Han Solo do? _

His eyes fly open and he’s spurred into action, his father’s voice in his head, memories of lectures and lessons and exaggerated stories told in the cockpit of the Falcon, every word accompanied by a stab of agony in his heart that he uses to force himself into moving faster.

He tears strips of cloth from his ragged cowl and wraps them around his bleeding, stinging hands, abandons his heaviest outer layers, everything extraneous. He disassembles his lightsaber, takes out the cracked crystal, and with a rush of vengeful satisfaction, crushes it under the heel of his boot. All the blasters on the ship are for soldiers, too big and unwieldy for his purposes, but he grabs one anyway, intending to trade it for a more suitable weapon when they make land.

It’s an antsy few hours while they fly and he paces, and then tries to sleep a little bit, but when they finally land in a bustling spaceport on who-the-hell-knows-where, he’s on his feet.

“Sir,” says a different stormtrooper, LR-2388, “I should warn you that the planet we’re on is technically Resist-”

“Don’t care,” Kylo says, waving his hand and knocking the trooper out. He hefts the bag of things he’s salvaged and stolen and collected onto his shoulder and marches out of the ship, heart in his throat, nervous and petrified and determined.

For the first time in years, he’s his own man. No one telling him what to do, no one trying to influence his choices or pull him in one direction or another. No Snoke, no Luke, nobody but Kylo. He doesn’t have a goal beyond  _ survive _ , and it feels fucking beautiful.

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [tumblr](http://thejgatsbykid.tumblr.com)!


End file.
